Former longtime Iola Register news and sports reporter Bob Johnson fondly recalls his 56 years of working at the newspaper.
Johnson is originally from Humboldt and got his start in journalism there when he was in high school. He took his first real job at the Pittsburg Sun a few years later when his guidance counselor helped him get the job.
“I got my first newspaper job in 1957 when I was a freshman in high school, that was with a newspaper in Humboldt. Mainly I was a printer’s devil. I ran the press, took care of little office jobs and made the fantastic wage of $6 a week,” said Johnson. “The guidance counselor at Humboldt, Jerry Hamm, his father-in-law, was the managing editor at the Pittsburg Sun.”
Johnson worked at the Sun while he pursued his studies at Pittsburg State.
Both were interrupted when he and his wife, Beverly, started a family and decided it best to return to Humboldt.
Johnson began his days at the Register in 1964 as a wire editor, where he would select which stories from the Associated Press would run in the Register. He also began covering sports in the 1960s before transitioning to covering news full-time years later.
“There were just two reporters, me and the editor, Emerson Lynn. He bought the paper on January 1, 1966, I came on July 6, 1964, so I had been here about a year and a half before he came,” explained Johnson.
Like many people around the Iola and Humboldt areas, the newspaper meant a lot to Johnson and he hoped to make it the best newspaper he could for the area’s readers. To this day, Johnson still believes the Iola Register is the best newspaper in eastern Kansas. That says a lot for a writer who worked at the newspaper for over half a century.
“It just meant a lot to me. I wanted the Register to be the best it could be and I think it’s the best paper in eastern Kansas. The people we have here now with Richard and Vickie, and of course Susan does a lot of writing, Tim does some and now you. We have a lot of good local stuff. That’s what people like to read is the local stuff and people they know,” Johnson said.
With the many years of sports coverage Johnson recalls, he says there are only a few figures that stick out that he can clearly remember taking to the fields and courts around Iola. Many of these athletes went on to play at big Division I programs and one even resembled a current computer company.
“The best I ever saw was a guy named Rex Close. He didn’t get a lot of notoriety like a lot of other players did because he was a linebacker but he was a good football player,” said Johnson. “Mackie McIntosh was one of the most enthusiastic football players I ever saw. ‘I want to win’ — that was his attitude.”
He’s also enjoyed watching his grandchildren play a variety of sports.
He makes a point of noting that his grandson, Maddox Johnson, currently plays football at Humboldt High School.
There is an abundance of sports history in the state including the Kansas City Monarchs and the Kansas City Athletics and Johnson recalls them with clarity.
“I’ve been a sports nut my whole life. I played ball, but wasn’t any good. I was always the last one picked for a team and played right field. But I still enjoyed it.
“The Athletics moved to Kansas City in 1955 and there were one or two years I heard every game they played on the radio,” said Johnson. “I’ve always been crazy about statistics too.”
